The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1887-05-23
THE NAVY'S VETERANS.
REV. TALMAGE ON REMEMBERING
SEAMEN AT DECORATION TIME.

Why Honors Should be Heaped Upon
the Graves of Those Who Go Down to
the Sea in Ships-The Sailors Useful
ness in Peaceful Commerce and in
WARS Rude Alarums."
BROOKLYN, May 22.-As this is the time
for the decoration Of the graves of those
who fell in the war, the naval posts invited
the Rev. T. Dewitt Talmage, D. D., to
preach sermon at the Brooklyn Tabernacle
appropriate to the occasion, as, often in the
annual commenioration, but little had been
said of those who served in the navy. An
American flag adorned the pulpit, and the
congregation sang with great spirit;
My country, It's of thee,
Sweet land of liberty.
Dr. Talmage's text was from James iii, 4:
sBehold also the ships" He said:
If this exclamation was appropriate about
1850 years ago, when it was written con-
cerning the crude fishing smacks that sailed
Lake Galilee, how much more appropriate
in an age which has launched from the dry
docks for purposes of peace-the Arizona of
the Guion Line, the City of Richmond of
the Inman Line, the Egypt of the National
Line, the Germanic of the White Star Line,
the Circassia of the Anchor Line, the
EtlJlria of the Cunard Line and the Great
Eastern, with hull six hundred and eighty
feet long-not a failure, for it helped lay
the Atlantic cable, and that was enough
glory for one ships exstence-and in an age
which for purposes of war has launched the
screw-sloops like the Idaho, the Shenan-
doah, the Ossippee, and our ironcads like
the Kalamazoo, the Roanoke and the Dun
derberg, and those which have already been
buried in the deep like the Monitor,
the Housatonic, the Weehawllen and
the Tecumseh, the tempests ever
since sounding a volley over their watery
sepulchres, and the SCARED veterans of war
shipping like the Constitution, or the Ali
ance, or the Constellation that have swung
into the naval yards to spend their last days,
their decks now all silent of the feet that
trod them, their rigging all silent of the
hands that chung to them, their portfolios
silent of the brazen throats that once thun-
dered out of them. If in the first century
when war vessels were dependent on the oars
that padded at the side Of them for propul-
sion, my text was suggestive, with how much
more emphasis, and meaning, and over
whelming reminiscence we can cry out, as
we see the Kearsarge lay across the bows of
the Alabama and sink it, teaching foreign
nations they had better keep their hands off
our American fight, or as we see
the ram Albemarle, of the Con-
federateS, running out and in
the Roanoke, and up and down the coast,
throwing everything into confusion as
no other craft ever did, pursued by the
Miami, the Cores, the Southfield, the Sassa-
GUS the Mattabesett, the Whitehead, the
Commodore Hull, the Louisiana, the Mime
sofa and other armed vessels all trying in
vain to catch her until Captain Cushing,
twenty-one years of age, and his men blew
her up, himself and only one other escaping,
and as see the flagship Hartford, and the
Richmond, and the Monongahela, with
other gunboats, sweep past the batteries of
Port Hudson and the Mississippi flows for
ever free to all Northern and Southern
craft, cry out with a patriotic emotion
that | cannot suppress, If | would, and
would not if | could: "Behold also the
ships"
At the annual decoration of graves, North
and South, among Federals and Confeder-
ates, full justice has been done to the memo
ry of those who fought on the land in our
sad contest, but not enough has been said of
those who on ships deck dared and suffered
all things. Lord God of the rivers and the
sea, help me in this sermon! So, ye ad-
mirals, commodores, commanders, captains,
pilots, gunners, boatswains, sailmakers,
surgeons, stokers, nessmates and seamen of
might as well get under way and stand out
towards sea. Let all land lubbers go
ashore Full speed now -Four bells
Never since the sea fight of Lepanto,
where three hundred royal galleys, manned
by fifty thousand warriors, at sunrise, Sept.
6, 1871, met two hundred and fifty royal
galleys manned by one hundred and twenty
thousand men, and in the four hours of
battle eight thousand fell ON one side and
4bn,,co,,1
never since the day when at Actium, thirty
one years before Christ, Augustus with two
hundred and sixty ships scattered the two
hundred and twenty ships of Mark Antony
and gained universal dominion as the prize:
yea, since the day at Salamis the twelve
hundred galleys of the Persians, manned by
five hundred thousand men, were crushed
by Greeks with less than a third of that
force; yea, never since the time of Noah,
the first ship captain, has the world
seen such miraculous creation as
that of the American navy in 1861.
There were about two hundred available
seamen in all the naval stations and re-
ceiving ships, and here and there an old
vessel. Yet orders were given to blockade
thirty-five hundred miles of sea coast,
greater than the whole coast Of Europe, and,
beside that, the Ohio, Tennessee, Cumber-
land, Mississippi and other great rivers, COW
6IlUR tAJtllJ VI IhO JuDilStiIlO miles,
were to be patrolled. No wonder the whole
civilized world burst into guffaw of laugh
ter at the seeming impoSsibility But the
work was done, done almost Immediately,
done thoroughly, and done with a speed and
cons,immate skill that eclipsed all the his
tory of naval architecture. What brilliant
achievements are suggested by the mere
mention of the names of the rear admirals.
If all they did should be written every one,
! suppose that even the world itself could
not contain the books that should be writ
ten. But these names have received the
honors due. The most of them went to their
graves under the cannonade of all the forts,
navy yards and men-of-war, the flags of all
the shipping and capitals at half mast.
But | recite today the deeds Of our naval
heroes who have not yet received appropri-
ate recognition. behold also the ships. "
AS we will never know what our national
prosperity is worth until we realize what it
cost, | recall the unrected fact that the men
of the navy ran especial risks. They had
not only the human weaponry to contend
with, but the tides, the fog, the storm. Not
like other ships could they run into harboy
at the approach of an equinox, or a cyclone,
or q hurricane because the harbors were
hostile. A miscalculation OF tide might
leave them on bar, and fog might over
throw all the plans of wisest commodore
and admiral, and accidentInight leave them.
not on the land ready for an ambulance but
at the bottom of the sea, as when the torpedo
blew up the Teculnseh in Mobile bay, and
nearly all on board persisted. They were at